The present invention relates to a printing apparatus and, more particularly, to a thermal transfer type printing apparatus which employs a thermal head.
A thermal transfer type printing apparatus was developed because of its advantageously small size and weight as well as its maintenance-free operation, and this kind of apparatus has been used, for example, in association with a facsimile or a copying apparatus. However, this thermal transfer type printing apparatus prints by transferring an ink layer from an ink ribbon onto a paper sheet in accordance with printing information. Therefore, a negative image corresponding to the printing information is formed on the ink ribbon thus transferred, and the printing information can be easily read from a discarded ink ribbon. Consequently, the printing information might be secretly or improperly transmitted by means of a used ink ribbon.